Compact Flash Association announces XQD card format

The Compact Flash Association has announced the development of the XQD memory card format. The smaller XQD format is based around the PCI Express specifications, allowing write speeds of 125MB/sec and beyond. The association says the first example cards will be shown at the CP+ trade show in Japan, in February 2012. No details of capacities or which camera makers are likely to support the standard are given.

The XQD card is closer in size to the Secure Digital format but retains the greater depth of a Compact Flash card.

Press Release:

The CompactFlash Association Announces the Recently Adopted XQDTM Specification as a New Memory Card Format

XQD Introduces Industry Leading Performance

CUPERTINO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The CompactFlash Association (CFA) is pleased to announce the release of the XQD specification as a new high performance memory card. This XQD specification is based on the PCI Express® specification, which provides a solid base for future performance scaling.

The CFA has adopted a new card specification with exciting performance and storage capabilities.

To distinguish the new memory card format, an XQD compatibility mark has been created.

“The XQD format will enable further evolution of hardware and imaging applications, and widen the memory card options available to CompactFlash users such as professional photographers,” said Mr. Shigeto Kanda of Canon, chairman of the board, CFA.

XQD cards will be shown at the CompactFlash Association booth at CP+ 2012, February 9-12 in Yokohama, Japan.

Licensing for CFA members will start in early 2012. Please contact the CompactFlash office for more information.

The success and survival of any product depends not in its design, performance, experts and none-experts glowing review / opinion BUT on the consumers wallet. The Sony Betamax was superior than the VHS in all respect but the consumers bought more VHS equipment and tapes. The Blue-ray specs is better than the DVD but the market penetration is not as good as projected.

As few posted comments, I also am NOT a professional photographer who may need a better memory card than the current SD/SDHC format. More likely than not, my current digital camera and memory module would outlived me. I handle my cameras with care, hence, have yet to experience physical failures of memory cards.

In the unlikely event that I need (not want) a new camera, I'll stick with the ones designed for SD/SDHC memory cards.

After reading some comments I gather than XQD will be like converting current SSD drive technology to a CF form factor. And many people ask what are the benefit.

The thing is that the rated speed is not the speed you get (in general). It may be the speed you get when when writing the first file on a fresh formatted card.

But from that point on the card have to do housekeeping operation a bit like a Tetris game to continue writing. When doing that, nothing new is written on the card so the effective speed is slower. If you decide to erase some photo, or change them on the card (ie rotate) then there's even more Tetris work to do in future writes.

All in all the mean effective real-life speed have almost nothing to do with rated speed. This is why there's different in real life speed against similar "Class N" SD card.

Again there's the question of cost to achieve said storage and speed. In general smaller means higher cost.

This is mostly used for top professional cameras that need the speed when shooting, rotating and other editing works usually happens when you do have more time. but when shooting away on a camera such as D4s, you're usually working on a card that you format each time you off load previous photos. My camera uses SD cards and I do that all the time.Even on editing the speed of the storage really counts, and its not just the speed of the head, but also the speed of data transfer. When I work on raws saved on my external hard drives, the speed really changed when I moved from USB 2 to USB 3. Not because of the speed of the Hard drive rps but because of the speed of data transfer between the hard and my computer.

This looks like a replacement for CF and not SD/SDHC/SDXC cards that are used in 99.9% of cameras shipping today. With SDXC cards today having speeds of 95MB/sec and future SDXC cards running at 300MB/sec + with up to 2TB capacity I don't see this having much of a market outside of FF Pro DSLRs.

Considering SD cards are reaching speeds of 95MB/s now, I find it hard to believe SD interface would not be enough for all SLR and sub-SLR cameras in year or two. Today even laptop hard drives come in size of bubblegum stick, so it's hard to see the physical space would be an issue on SD either.

To me this looks like a stunt for CompactFlash association trying to be relevant without any actual *need* for yet another competing card standard.

If someone knows why we need this instead of just fast SD cards, I'm interested in hearing it.

I was just thinking recently how, by today's technoligal standards, that removing a card and putting it in a wired card reader to transfer images seems a bit primitive. Here's what I'd like to see: 250 GB (for now) solid state drive built into camera body. When I'm done shooting, I fire up the computer, pair using Bluetooth, then proceed to download images from camera, wirelessly.

Until then...

I have used CF and SD. I much prefer CF for its size, durability, and simplicity. I have never bent pins or experienced any problems. On the other hand, SD are too small, fragile and flimsy. I've had more than a few SD cards break. One the shell cracked open and another the lock mechanism came out and on another the plastic struts that separate each contact broke off.

I understand that a new format may be needed to address performance issues, so I'm open minded on a new format. Let's just get it dialed in so we can limit the number and different types of media cards.

Shazam! Your wish is granted, oh great one:http://www.trustedreviews.com/Eye-Fi-Pro-X2_Camera-Accessory_reviewWell, except for the 250GB part...... and the part about 'built in' (but you could always superglue the card access door shut I suppose ;)

GearGuru - there are WiFi type SD/SDHC in the market for almost a year. Between my wife and myself, we have fairly inexpensive digital cameras: 2 pocket size (Lumix & Kodak), 1 Fuji Finefix, and 1 Nikon D300. We also have two inexpensive digital video recorder. These gadgets use SD/SDHC cards. In all, we have a dozen of these cards, varying from 9 years to a few months. I have yet to experience ANY failure you described nor any failure at all. Are you, perhaps, a professional photographer working in very rough environment?

In my earlier post, I mentioned having dozens of memory cards. Started with the then huge 528 mb for $49. As the capacity increased coupled with price drop, I bought 2, 3, 8, and 16 gb capacity. I stopped at 16 gb and limit its use to the video camera. I used the 8 gb on the DLSR and the smaller 4 gb on the pocket camera for the same reason Zds stated: Dare not to put many eggs into same (one) basket in case of equipment failure or lost. I also experienced 4 and 8 gb cards to be more cost effective than the huge 16, 32, 64 and 128 gb.

If I am thinking about usability of new and traditional technlogies then I notice that such wireless technogies have more practical purposes. When I am thinking about internal memory (e.g.in the camera) and its connecting to more types external devices I prefer performance and save energy. I would buy a new camera but why? I am not professional photographer, I want to pay for sameting what I can use about minimal 5 years including accessories ...

We can see similar cases in the evolution of S-Video, DVI, HDMI, Display Port etc. what new interface whose head-piece are thinking about .... (TNT LCD, IPS, LED LCD, 3D etc.) ???

A god example for photography devices can be IBM's technologies such as Power 7, 7+ and 8 and their systems like System i (historical AS400, iSeries) or AMR's, AMD's a NVidia's technologies ...

i have compac camera, camcorder, DSLR, cell phone, mp3 player, I already own 5 kind of media cards, do we need to add another card? I just wish there are just 1-2 kind of cards, then the world will be more perfect

Agreed. None of the current card formats are really physically robust. I have had a few SD cards fall apart on me with normal use. And CF cards have pins in the camera - the most fragile part of the card interface is attached to the $1000 device!

CFast was never intended for consumer applications — it's intended for industrial equipment — so I guess this is CFA's attempt to get back into the consumer world. Given the almost universal adoption of SD/SDHC/SDXC in current consumer devices, CFA's got quite the up-hill struggle. Maybe in some of the pro equipment. I guess we'll see.

And I have to agree... "SD" was inexplicable but at least pronounceable. "XQD"? Really?

This is good news - PCI-e is mature and <<fast>>. The fastest MLC/SLC NAND storage units in use today are running over PCI-e. SD is not going to be this fast and will never catch up. Ever. Assuming cameras had the bus speed to take advantage of these cards, you'd have buffer speeds to card capacity.

SD UHS II has specifications up to 304 MB/s, so way faster than anything CF can offer. Something was necessary for pros that for some reason feel SD is inferior. However, I will say those XQD cards look more physically robust than SD, but still offer a small size so they should be able to fit dual cards without the massive amount of room required to do the same with CF.

Why do you think SD can't match the PCI-e speeds? Two serial interfaces, one designed for portable devices, another designed to live inside a PC. I do not see any reason why the SD would not stay better for mobile use.

Currently both SD and CF solutions cap at 95-100MB/s, so I suspect the interface speed is indeed not a limiting factor, but something else.

If you shoot Hollywood movies, or medium format, then XQD might be home there, but for DSLRs..

The big advantage here is that this XQD is Solid State Drive (SSD) that some of us use in our computers for the main OS (read/write speeds of 250 MB/s, 170 MB/s). We already have DSLRs that use Dual-core processors and the advent of 4K cameras/camcorders, Class 10 SD cards just won't cut it.

I agree with you, in my opinion we should still use floppy discs, but the big old ones, or what about a punched card?? I wish all that came after failed! Screw new technologies, improvements, progressions, evolution, revolution, having things easier, having things better - screw all that! And btw: get off my lawn! ; )

The reason why there are mini/micro versions is for even smaller devices that could use the extra room for jam-packing electronics. Cell phones would be a little bulkier if they used CF or regular size SD cards.

And how often do you take that microSD card out of your cell phone? Probably rarely since you can just hook it up via USB to sync files (less chance of losing it).

You don't have use for a super small flash card. Some do. Some may have use for a huge pick-up truck. Some don't, so they offer the Smart car. By your logic, we should only have a truck, 4-door sedan, or a bicycle offered for transportation (forget all the nonsense in-between vehicles).

SDXC is the only inexcusable one (that's actually out there, forget MMC, miniSD, etc.). They came out with a whole version to support 4GB->32GB. Really? Whole chance to revamp the standard and you... cover only about a 10x size increase.Why is that? Because a lack of innovation has us using the same disk format those 5.25" floppies used ON OUR 32GB SD CARDS, and it finally gave its last gasp at that size.Thanks, Microsoft.Unbelievable how often the "640K is enough" mentality shows up. When you have 2MB, plan for 2EB or more with the next rev. of the filesystem.

:D finally some sense! Nothing is forever. If, just if, this format also would get speed that makees it the new HD formet in computers, it has a change of being something great. For a while. ... I'm still laughing when I think about the ppl who talked about "protecting their investment" when SD slot appeared in cameras and they just bought a 512MB CF card... Nothing lasts forever.

The "controller" is what separates a regular flash card from a "proper" SSD (it tends to yield higher read/write rates).

I'm not exactly sure how the newer SD cards are doing the high transfer rates, but the newer controllers for SSDs (at least the ones for computers) are getting faster and faster and extend the longevity of each cell.

I like it. It's proportions are like a miniature HD. A little more body to it compared to flimsy SD cards.

*wants to have a couple in his hand and churn them around like pebbles*

Whether this new standard is needed or not with current write speed requirements, I bet that there are a lot of manufacturers ready to embrace this, even if it's just to flaunt a novelty spec compared to the competition.

Capacity. At any given state of SD technology, you can fit, what, four SD cards into one of these?Does seem like it's complete overkill for any kind of still camera, though, unless UHS-I proves unreliable.Mini laptops and 4K video?

Totally forgettable 'name', another standard that customers won't want to invest in, and too close in size and performance to existing standards.

The only good thing is that it is based on PCI-E specifications, but that's about all I can see. Without a major manufacturer announcing support for XQD, I'd guess it will be as popular as xD memory cards are now.

the problem with compact flash is that data is transferred between the camera and the card by parallel communication and as the transfer speeds increase there is a problem of cross-talk and clock skew which affect this process, as cameras and devices continually demand greater speed very soon there will be a bottleneck in performance which they cant get past hence a new standard for faster data transfers

The CF card is bad form factor. In this day and age it's just too darn big, plus the worrying thing about its design is that it is wider than longer. Fumbling in the dark it is possible to try and insert it sideways. That explains a lot of bent pin problems.

Note, CF cards in their current form top out at 128GB which we are just getting to now (CF cards are based on IDE ATA-5). There is the CFast format based on SATA, but that never caught on. I suspect the main home for XQD will be in embedded devices as a disk drive (where CF is already used today when laptop drives are too big), and not in digital cameras. It may be the high end video cameras will use it, but I don't play in that market.

this development has more significance for the CF devices and users, you are right SD cards have a long way to go and I dont see a replacement for them in the next decade. Only something cataclysmic can replace SD cards -after-all they are now the dominant form of memory cards. I do think this XQD will eventually replace CF cards in professional cameras and camcoders and anything needing high data transfer speeds. Its early days on these XQD it probably will be the end of the decade before they really take off big time, remeber how SD cards were anounced around 2000 and they only really started to dominate and take over 5 to 6 years later....

Ahh, but does it use easily-bendable/breakable pins (the biggest point of failure in the current CF spec) or does it use the small more-robust tabs like SDHC and PCIe cards? If it still uses pins, it's DOA.

I've had exactly one mechanical failure associated with cards, and it's an SD card. It lost it's lock switch, making it permanently locked, and thus useless. Thousands and thousands of insertions and extractions of CF cards have resulted in 100% reliability.

A small piece of scotch tape overlaying the lock switch channel will help that. The same trick is used for missing 3-1/2'' floppy disk tabs.The only type of card that will stay in a read-only state after loosing its (or damaged) lock switch are the Sony memory sticks.

There are some devices with a short enough track that you can put the card in upside down and smash the pins, which happened to me on a Vosonic portable storage unit. It didn't help that this device you put the card in face down compared to every other reader where you put it face up. In reading the various comments about it, I wasn't the only one who bent the pins.